If it were true that we must marry the one we love and so many are choosing those they fall in love with, then why are there so many divorces. The problem is that falling in and out of love happens in marriage too because it is all based on feelings that change all the time. When our love is based on a choice to love someone the feelings do come but the choice must be there first.
Also when we choose someone based on their character that does not change as the feelings come and go. The basic character of a person is deeply embedded in their soul. When there is pretense in dating the couple is on their best behavior, their real self does not begin to leak out until they spend every day and night with that person.
We must watch how a person interacts with their mother, father and siblings to have an idea about their character. We also need to see how they respond to challenges that are uncomfortable. Trials bring out the real us.
Trials can shape our character if we care about becoming a better person, but mostly trials reveal who we are on the inside when our responses leaks to the outside. That leaking is the real person, not the false one that is kind and good when all is going our way.
Love is a choice and is commanded by God.
Mark 12:31 "…30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ No other commandment is greater than these.”
Mark 12:31 is a command!!!
For those young people who laugh at old people who have a hard time using their I-phones.
We still have one of these phones that works. We don't have it connected to the wall because we gave up our house phones to only use cells. I never thought I'd see the day that someone would not know how to use these phones. LOL
"13 But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.
14 You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them,
15 and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;
17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work."
If I had a desire or a thought of doing something I asked for God to show me His will about it.
If He didn't want me to do it He took it out of my heart and I no longer desired it.
When He wanted me to do it the pieces fell into place and were set up without me trying. If something is from God He sets up all the details, we know it by the way they come together flawlessly.
God gives us the desires of our hearts when our heart lines up with His will.
Psalm 37:3-5 "…3 Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. 4 Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart. 5 Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will do it.…"
We can see how the false teachers have twisted God's word to make it seem as though God will give us what we want as long as we believe hard enough. God does not teach this in His world.
Psalm 66:17-19 "…17 I cried out to Him with my mouth and praised Him with my tongue. 18 If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. 19 But God has surely heard; He has attended to the sound of my prayer.…"
God will not hear the prayers of those who do not worship Him.
Isaiah 1:14-16 "…14 I hate your New Moons and your appointed feasts; they have become a burden to Me; I am weary of bearing them. 15 When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide My eyes from you; even though you multiply your prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are covered with blood. 16 Wash and cleanse yourselves. Remove your evil deeds from My sight. Stop doing evil!…"
There is no scripture that says if we speak something it will come to pass. There are no scriptures that say we must muster up enough faith for our prayers to be answered.
James 4:3
"You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions."
God is not pleased with those who demand and command things of the Lord. This is presumptuous and arrogant.
However there are many scriptures that indicate that when we walk with God He changes our desires into His desires and then He will bless what we do that glorifies and honors Him.
1 John 5:14
"And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us."
We are to obey God after we are born again. One of those obediences is being baptized as a witness to others. Also when the Holy Spirit comes into us at the moment of salvation we are being baptized in the Holy Spirit. This is an act done by God to seal us as His child.
Ephesians 1:13-14 "…12 in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, would be for the praise of His glory. 13 And in Him, having heard and believed the word of truth— the gospel of your salvation— you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the pledge (promise) of our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession, to the praise of His glory.…"
God never breaks a promise!!!
Amen, God has blessed this country with every good thing and yet the people have become "entitled" thinking they deserve it while demanding it. They stick their index finger in the air and proudly proclaim "we are number one and we will stay number one" as though their just saying it gives them power.
I am weary of these prideful sports like mantras that build and maintain pride in the people. This people boast of being unsinkable and unbeatable, somewhat akin to the mentality of those who built the Titanic.
Those who are entitled will find out one day that they are not number one, that they cannot make themselves great, revealing just how ungrateful they all were to God Who gave them truth that they ignore.
Alan Brayshaw quoted this:
" The goal of Satan, to damn every person to hell inspite of God’s grace. Look at America the number one means of the devil to destroy the whole nation isn’t alcoholics, drugs, immoral actions. ( these things will indeed send a person to hell ) How can satan damn an entire nation to hell including the church. His plan is so simple that even the church overlooks it. What destroys the building blocks of society, sends the family into a downward tail spin? Just get society busy about themselves, leaving no time to talk to God or pray nor read His word. It only takes less than 50 years to produce a society that is cursed with the goal of Satan, a busy nation. Too busy for family life, too busy for God or His house, too busy to pray, too busy to spend time in God’s word. We have become cursed all the while talking about how blessed we are. Satan receives the glory of a society that has gotten so busy that the society has lost time for God. I repent for being so busy that I have made God only a casual relationship..." (((( David Tolbert ))))
